Sentist War
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The Sentist War, also known as the War in Ceris, was an armed conflict on the island of Ceris between a loose coalition of 7 states against the Sentists, a radical terror group. Beginning with the Sentist invasion of Hodrea in January 2020, the conflict raged throughout most of the island for over 16 months, coming to an end with the capture of High Priest Wetzel Carran and the subsequent collapse of the Sentist group. An estimated $$ million died in the conflict, most of which were civilians who lost their lives through the Sentist depopulation campaigns in northern Ceris. While some coalition forces have withdrawn, many remain in peacekeeping and humanitarian roles, with an estimated $$ soldiers and support personnel still deployed on the island.
Background
In 1944 the Seylosian Mandate commenced its war into Ceris. It quickly secured alliances with Eastern Ceris countries running into the Hodrean Kingdom, which controlled the rest of Ceris. Mandate tanks crossed the border in the early months of the year, quickly pushing back the Hodrean Kingdom. Though there were hard setbacks, eventually the Seylosian Mandate gained control of the entirety of Ceris, turning its eye away to the rest of the world. After the conclusion of the war, Seylos reverted back to its monarchy, releasing the whole of Ceris to the Hodrean Kingdom. What followed was a devastating series of independence wars which rocked the entire island.
Without the strong Seylosian occupation, the entirety of Ceris minus the east, fell into war. Splinter states appeared everywhere resulting in the many Ceriser countries that exist today. The most infamous of these wars occured between Hodrea and Rewhain, which resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Rewhainians but eventual independence for the country.
For some time after the wars for independence, peace was relatively prominent in Ceris. However the Ceriser population began to increase exponentially, far beyond its economic ability to sustain. With low economic opportunity, but access to more advanced Seylosian medical foriegn aid the population increased to the point where it was several times that the island of Seylos. In the early 2000s Seylos began a program to distribute aid across the island to combat the problem but it was only a bandage. Soon rival factions were at each others throats again vying for power. In 2004 the Hodrean control of Occlait collapsed leading to several warlords contesting for power over the vast area. The Dolch majority country of Rusheau began a campign of harrasment against its neighbors leading to several bloody border skirmishes.
Underneath it all a new religion had begun to form. One that had become obsessed with solving Ceris's problems of excess. Early on divisions had taken place in this new Sentist religion on dealing with the issue. In 2016, The Speaker began to rise in prominence amongst his people in the south, becoming a more moderate leader to the Sentist believers. In the north, a more radical leader began to emerge, The High Priest, devoting his preaching towards solving Ceris's real problem in his eyes. The population.
An alliance of convience occured and revolution spread throughout Ceris. Deep in the south the Speaker seized control of weak Ceriser governments establishing Sentist control and a government to rule it. In the north the High Priest had no such goals, sending forth his zealot armies to conquer as much as possible without the consideration of governance.
Course of the war
On January 1st, 2020 Northern Sentist forces struck a major Hodrean city for the first time. They had already skirmished with Hodrean Militia members before the engagement but only one survivor had escaped. Picked up by Nicole and Kieron Bretz and brought back to Kassel. At the same time a Seylosian special forces unit, SF13, had been dispatched to the city to retrieve Nicole Bretz who was an intelligence operative for the Seylosians. By the time SF13 had arrived the city was embroiled in conflict trying to hold off the Sentist attack. Traditional attacks had failed against the old walled city, and with a lack of artillery support the commander decided to use chemical weapons to take it. unwilling to lose her nephew she gave him her only gask mask and a laptop containing her gathered intelligence. SF13 fled fro the city, with only Lieutenant Maura and Corporal Oswin surviving from the original group.
With the destruction of Kassel Sentist forces went on the full offensive. In the south, the Speaker gegan his campaign on the weak Ceriser nations that inhabited the region. They began to fall quickly as he established control. He was however careful to preserve infrastructure and civilians during his campaign. The Southern Sentists then began supplying the north with mar materiel. The Northern Sentists continued their agressive campaign, easily destroying what few Hodrean units stood in their path. Seylos became aware of the destruction in Kassel and dispatched the First Fleet along with its contingent of five hundred Royal Marines to the capital of Liechnenfax.
Upon their arrival Seylosian forces, along with a thousand remaining Hodrean militia set up defenses outside the city, supported by the First Fleet and the aircraft carrier HMS Defiant. Soon the Sentists struck with overwhelming numbers. At the beginning of the battle almost one hundred thousand Sentists assaulted the two forces only numbering one thousand five hundred. The allies continuously fell back until the Sentists reached the city center, their ultimate goal. With them they had brought a large quanitiy of highly explosive materials, which were stockpiled at the city center. They gathered as much of the population as they could and forced them within the local area and retreated afterwards. They had hoped to destroy the Seylosian force, but it was saved by The Speaker of the Southern Sentists who had travelled personally to warn the Seylosians. Angered at his counterparts turn to genocide, he had decided to betray him to the Seylosians. The Seylosian and Hodrean forces were saved, though the subsequent explosion devastated the city and lit fires which consumed most of it.
After the Battle of Liechnenfax the Southern Sentists, now the Sentist State, cut off supplies to the Northern Sentists as well as any other support. Despite their religious affiliation, The Speaker did not believe death was the calling of their relgion and broke off ties, ceasing his advances into Ceris and strengthening the State he had already established. By then Gallambrian soldiers and Seylosian reinforcements had landed in Hodrea. In the east Seylosian aligned nations had begun fighting back and Tagmatium had begun organizing a response from Secryae.
Aftermath
Impact on Ceris
War crimes
Sentist war crimes were committed on a mass scale, however they lacked any sort of industrial means to do mass killings. According to Seylosian units pushing into deep Sentist territory there were few work camps encountered. It appears the majority of Sentist war crimes were executed in small regions that were quarantined and deprived of food and water for long periods. Entire sections of hodrea sometimes numbering in the hundreds of square kilometers, were cut off from the outside world and starved out to kill sections of the population. For cities that the Northern Sentist armies had conquered, work camps were stablished and run to create labor for the Sentist war effort against to the coalition. Due to the nature of these camps, little production efficiency was achieved and mass casualities were reported amongst the workers.
The Northern Sentist Armies also enslaved sections of what they considered "excess population" to industrial work on war material and special projects. These peoples were given enough resources to survive to continue production unlike their camp counterparts. However conditions were still brutal resulting to many casualties in the working environment. One camp of note was called the "Ketfallen Production Bereich" which was liberated by Bridagier Ryley at the end of the campaign.
The most brutal of Sentist war crimes occured in two areas. In Kassel Sentist launched a chemical weapons attack slaughtering the population after they had successfully defended against traditional attacks. Kieron Bretz was saved from the destruction of Kassel by SF13 as well as the intelligence his aunt had gathered. The worst of all Sentist war crimes however occured on May 19th, 2020 with the detonation of a massive cahce of explosives built up after pushing back Seylosian forces in the Siege of Liechnenfax. Though the initial explosion caused little damage, the fires spread throughout the city creating massive firestorms and devasting the majority of the densely populated city.